Quote from: Brad;1123525Why is a giant spider just a beast instead of a monstrosity? An ankheg could arguably be just as natural a creature as a giant spider because there's nothing particularly crazy about an animal that spits acid (ants?). It's just really big. But so is the spider.

Fun bit of trivia: giant spiders (at least in D&D) seem to be based on those in Tolkien's works. The funny thing about the giant spiders in Middle Earth is that they're actually the descendants of an alien named Ungoliant that assumed the form of a giant spider when it appeared in Middle Earth (similar to how in the Exalted cosmology, fair folk have to travel through "nirakara" to take form).

Quote from: deadDMwalking;1123537In some ways, but IF you want to talk to other people who play games about their experiences, having a common reference makes sense.  If someone says, "yeah, we defeated the Tomb of Horrors with no casualties the first time through - our druid turned into a Beholder and that solved a lot of problems", that's going to imply a very different type of table environment than most.  

Trying to come up with a fair mechanic on the fly for me, as the DM, to tell the player what it takes to successfully turn into a beholder is a tall order[/b.]

Maybe if I had a month to plan, but this??

IIRC, 5e originally wrote wild shape with an internal balance but discarded this during playtested after complaints even though the replacement was an unbalanced mess. I think the original rules are still floated around or were reintroduced as an Unearthed Arcana article or something.

Quote from: Slipshot762;1123539to my eye taxonomic classification with rules impact first appeared in earnest in 3e. Before this there was a much looser definition of rules regarding what it means to be undead for example. I dislike the classification, if you have a sword that does extra holy damage to demons or undead the dm should let that apply as he sees fit on a case by case basis rather than have his hands tied by players arguing that a given creature has such and such type descriptors and so should / shouldn't be affected. I don't need Shao Khan to have the outsider descriptor to know that he is native to another plane and I would likely allow a holy sword vs demons/undead get its bonus damage on him as such. Now templates like vampire or lich was a great innovation, but the 3e habit of assigning a type descriptor to everything was foolish and limiting in my opinion, it gave a certain type of player room to argue all sorts of trash based on this magic the gathering creature type notion.

As a matter of fact, I was always confused by why Turn Undead never affected demons even though it seemed to operate on similar logic to the Paladin's Smite Evil. Always made more sense to me to use a more generic "Turn Anathema" that could be customized by the cleric's deity. For example, being able to turn alcoholics or windmills.

Quote from: Slipshot762;1123539but the 3e habit of assigning a type descriptor to everything was foolish and limiting in my opinion, it gave a certain type of player room to argue all sorts of trash based on this magic the gathering creature type notion.

Such as?  The rules are pretty clear about what a type does and does not.  Can you provide a specific example of a 'trash argument' that's not immediately and obviously resolved by reference to the rules?

Quote from: Brad;1123491No matter how sophisticated the technology gets, until it understands the spirit of what constitutes a strike, the computer will never be as good as the umpire.

I apologize for being obstreperous, but what exactly is "the spirit of what constitutes a strike"? Either the ball is within the strike zone or outside of it, and in principle it seems like a good enough camera system should be able to track that at least as well as a human, if not eventually better.

Now that said, RPGs are not baseball, so the places where GMs have to make judgement calls are certainly more numerous. But the thesis that a clear, explicit and simple-to-evaluate rule is desireable as a way of reducing the necessity of such calls seems to me like a good idea.

the poster above you presents what i think counts as an example of such, demons/devils by strict 3e rules generally cannot be turned, but in real world lore the act of turning or presenting a show of faith that repels or purges evil works just as well on demons as undead, rolled well enough you can force the demon from the pea soup projectile vomiting peasant girl entirely, it feels to me thematically appropriate and i'd allow it, yet edgy players would insist that demons must also have the undead descriptor for it to work. a Fun encounter where the turning pc can dramatically best demons "the power of pelor compels you" ruined by an argumentative player and a set of arbitrary descriptors. Now we have to cast banishment...and does that even work if the pit fiend has magic jarred young mary sue? I was happier when the cleric could roll turning to force the fiend out of her now i'm having finger fuck descriptors and splatbooks and shit.

Quote from: deadDMwalking;1123531IApplying the rules as written shields me from accusations of favoritism or antagonism.  If I say 'hydras are not dragons, it doesn't work' and the rules back me up, there's no chance that the players are going to feel like I'm being unnecessarily limiting on their creativity.  Alternatively, if it doesn't say and I say it does work, some players might feel I'm pulling my punches and making things TOO easy.  

I can ALWAYS change the rules, no matter what, so not having a rule that comes up is NOT a defense of the quality of the rules.  

There are a lot of questions about type that the DM may not want to have to answer on a case-by-case basis, and there is CERTAINLY a chance for unintended consequences if they do.  What creatures should a druid be able to turn into?  Should they be able to turn into a pegasus, a giant spider, an ankheg, a beholder?  Using type lets you answer that question consistently from table to table, and if you decide differently for whatever reason, it's clear you're using a variant rule.  There's value in that.

Who the hell are you playing with? Sounds like a bunch of pain-in-the-ass players to me. If you say hydras aren't dragons, they're not. The written rules are ultimately irrelevant to a game you're running in the end. Also, if you're worried that someone will have a different experience at your table vs. another, what does that say about your DMing..? You should WANT players to have a different experience because you're better than the cookie-cutter bullshit they can get playing Neverwinter Nights masquerading as a person.

RE: druid, here's the text from AD&D.

2. Ability to change form up to three times per day, actually becoming, in all respects save the mind, a reptile, bird or mammal.
A. Each type of creature form can be assumed but once per day.
B. The size of creature form assumed can vary from as small as a bullfrog, bluejay, or bat to as large as a large snake, an eagle, or a black bear (about double the weight of the druid).
C. Each assumption of a new form removes from 10% to 60% (d6, multiply by 10) of the hit points of damage, if any, the druid has sustained prior to changing form.

You can blame later editions of the game for turning this into some sort of pseudo-lycanthropy so the druid can fuck shit up in combat.

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser;1123543I apologize for being obstreperous, but what exactly is "the spirit of what constitutes a strike"? Either the ball is within the strike zone or outside of it, and in principle it seems like a good enough camera system should be able to track that at least as well as a human, if not eventually better.

Now that said, RPGs are not baseball, so the places where GMs have to make judgement calls are certainly more numerous. But the thesis that a clear, explicit and simple-to-evaluate rule is desireable as a way of reducing the necessity of such calls seems to me like a good idea.

A strike is a ball within the strike zone. The strike zone varies for a variety of reasons, it's not a consistent value, nor should it be. Think of it this way: if a player is figuring out a way to abuse the strike zone to get BBs, the umpire can start liberally applying his judgement to call a strike instead. Same as if some munchkin designs a 100 point HERO character than can launch nukes out of his hands. The GM can just say GTFO with that crap.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1123534The problem is that the distinction between dragons and any other reptiles isn't intuitive, especially once you start getting into comparative mythology. ... For that matter, the definitions rely on having a modern Western education so that you know what an "ecology" is when medieval scholars had no concept of it.

...How do you define "mundane" and determine what does and doesn't qualify? Why is that distinction on the same level as distinguishing construct, living, and undead? Why would that be baked into the in-universe laws of physics so thoroughly that it applies in the way that the game rules say so?

...I prefer using a taxonomy mechanic that feels intuitive for most people, rather than operating on arbitrary game logic that only make a twisted sort of sense to people who have internalized D&D lore.

...I dislike using the supernatural/natural distinction because it starts breaking down when applied to fantasy settings where the supernatural may be commonplace, or even medieval bestiaries where plenty of natural creatures had properties that seem supernatural to us now.... The whole "unnatural" criterion doesn't make sense, either. It's not possible to universally define what is and isn't natural....

I appreciate the points you're raising but it does look like you're contradicting yourself here.  Is it possible to intuitively classify monsters on the fly in a way that makes sense and is easy to remember and keep consistent, or isn't it?

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser;1123548I appreciate the points you're raising but it does look like you're contradicting yourself here.  Is it possible to intuitively classify monsters on the fly in a way that makes sense and is easy to remember and keep consistent, or isn't it?

I think that it is possible to do that.  I hope so, since I'm depending on it for some of my system rules.  However, I think to do it, the very minimum requirements are:

1. Considerable care put into the names and focus of the tags.
2. Carefully limit the scope of what the tags are meant to do (lest the edge cases from a more wide-ranging scope sink the whole effort).
3. Build the system from the ground up with the classification system in place.

I do not believe is it possible to do so in D&D while still keeping the game near its traditional range.  It is possible in D&D to use tagging as a mere communication device, a short-hand on which to hang a few rules.  

Note also that this issue is not limited to games.  It can rear its ugly head anytime someone tries to retroactively apply an overly ambitious tagging scheme for both classification and process rules.  Plus, it doesn't take much ambition to hit "overly".

Quote from: Brad;1123546A strike is a ball within the strike zone. The strike zone varies for a variety of reasons, it's not a consistent value, nor should it be.

On the Major League Baseball website the strike zone is officially defined as, "The official strike zone is the area over home plate from the midpoint between a batter's shoulders and the top of the uniform pants -- when the batter is in his stance and prepared to swing at a pitched ball -- and a point just below the kneecap. In order to get a strike call, part of the ball must cross over part of home plate while in the aforementioned area."

Now the actual value of that is going to differ from player to player but the rule by which it's judged does not; the definition is consistent even if the result varies. And if you added motion-tracking dots to uniforms so that a camera could follow them easily, I don't see why a computer couldn't do this. Heck, the fact that some camera replays end up invalidating umpire calls suggests that there's less of a "spirit" to the definition of a strike than we might think.

QuoteSame as if some munchkin designs a 100 point HERO character than can launch nukes out of his hands. The GM can just say GTFO with that crap.

Sure, but that's not a rules-interpretation call -- by RAW the player's done nothing wrong. That's a group-participation call -- like the umpire throwing a player out for displaying "improper on-field conduct", which isn't defined by a rule and in theory can be anything the umpire doesn't like.

I'm not disputing the value or necessity of judgement calls, I'm just pointing out that anywhere the rules can be explicit and clear enough to make them unnecessary is usually a good thing.

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser;1123551On the Major League Baseball website the strike zone is officially defined as, "The official strike zone is the area over home plate from the midpoint between a batter's shoulders and the top of the uniform pants -- when the batter is in his stance and prepared to swing at a pitched ball -- and a point just below the kneecap. In order to get a strike call, part of the ball must cross over part of home plate while in the aforementioned area.

Except that's not always the case.

Quote from: Slipshot762;1123544the poster above you presents what i think counts as an example of such, demons/devils by strict 3e rules generally cannot be turned, but in real world lore the act of turning or presenting a show of faith that repels or purges evil works just as well on demons as undead, rolled well enough you can force the demon from the pea soup projectile vomiting peasant girl entirely, it feels to me thematically appropriate and i'd allow it, yet edgy players would insist that demons must also have the undead descriptor for it to work. a Fun encounter where the turning pc can dramatically best demons "the power of pelor compels you" ruined by an argumentative player and a set of arbitrary descriptors. Now we have to cast banishment...and does that even work if the pit fiend has magic jarred young mary sue? I was happier when the cleric could roll turning to force the fiend out of her now i'm having finger fuck descriptors and splatbooks and shit.

My thoughts exactly. My favorite mental image of this has always been an explicitly Christian cleric/paladin/whatever who holds up a crucifix against demons/undead/other evil doers, cries "the power of Christ compels you" repeatedly, and upon winning the spiritual combat/exorcism then the demon/undead/whatever explodes into pea soup, and the green slime comically showers our hero every time like an old Nickelodeon program.

But I digress.

Anyway, I've always been frustrated by the arbitrary distinction between demons and undead in D&D. The monster manuals explicitly stated a lot of undeads were just demons sent to the material plane, so why wouldn't the same exorcisms affect them? When you're dealing with constructs or undeads or whatever animated by a mystic force, I would think it matters what that force is whether it be a ghost, a demon, an angel, an elemental, etc. For example, if you're dealing with something animated/possessed by a demon then I would think that exorcisms would work against it. A demonically possessed laundromat/car/whatever is running around killing people? An exorcism should work!

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1123566My thoughts exactly. My favorite mental image of this has always been an explicitly Christian cleric/paladin/whatever who holds up a crucifix against demons/undead/other evil doers, cries "the power of Christ compels you" repeatedly, and upon winning the spiritual combat/exorcism then the demon/undead/whatever explodes into pea soup, and the green slime comically showers our hero every time like an old Nickelodeon program.

That's more easily solved by saying 'Turn Undead' works on creatures with the [Evil] subtype.

Quote from: deadDMwalking;1123567That's more easily solved by saying 'Turn Undead' works on creatures with the [Evil] subtype.

That doesn't exist in 5e, which is the edition I am primarily criticizing.

That's why I previously suggesting a customizable power called "Turn Anathema" where the anathema varies by the nature of the character's patron deity/saint/whatever. If the patron is the good of goodness, light, and everything nice, then the anathema in this case would be any personifications of evil (and by extension, corpses or trees or whatever animated by one).

I certainly think that if you're going to have a generic cleric class, and use the same class for the 'god of death', the 'god of industry' and the 'god of good' that it makes sense to allow turn/rebuke to work differently between them.  Picking the 'anathema' helps make the gods more interesting.

Quote from: Brad;1123491Not debating that at all; pretty sure it started with RPGA and kept going to whatever it's called now...Adventurer's League? But AD&D claimed to do this and it still required a fair referee. D&D 3.X and beyond can be run with someone who blindly follows the rules. I liken it the having an umpire in baseball vs. using a camera/computer. No matter how sophisticated the technology gets, until it understands the spirit of what constitutes a strike, the computer will never be as good as the umpire.

You'd change your mind pretty fast if you were batting and the umpire thought six inches off the outside corner was within "the spirit of what constitutes a strike."